June 17

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Nan Clinton is a lifelong Joliet, Illinois resident.  She enjoyed a long and fulfilling career in education as a Montessori teacher, high school teacher, and school administrator. Nan has many stories to tell that are playful, hilarious, and entertaining. Along with sharing her whimsical side and life experiences, Nan's stories also can be both poignant and thought-provoking. Nan believes that storytelling is the bond that reconnect--stories convey the humanness in all of us.

Barbara Kirby spent many years as an elementary school teacher. Eventually, she transferred her teaching skills to become an editor for textbook publishing companies, such a McGraw Hill and Pearson. She also became a consultant for an educational testing company--a job that required quite a bit of travel to multiple states. A few years agoher children bought her a subscription to Storyworth. They asked her questions about her life, and she loved writing the answers. A book was published with her short stories. Now she enjoys telling these stories to the Stories R Us audiences. She wishes to thank Barbara Eberhard for mentoring her through storytelling workshops.

Mary Parkhurst claims to be a former teacher, retired dentist  forever grandmother and have had a long-time love of Stories I have been a fan of this group for many years, touched by the many stories of others’ lives.  I finally decided to jump in and share some of mine, a scary move but I have been supported every step of the way.

Tom Reilly is an education technology leader, dad, and lover of the outdoors. He began his storytelling career in high school to explain his whereabouts to his mom. Tom has since told stories with The People Tree, Let Me Tell You, Teller's Night, This Much is True, and As I was Saying.

Chris Rooney has been a resident of Oak Park for 30 years. While he comes from a long line of storytellers, he was introduced to formal storytelling by Errol McLendon in 2024. Since then, he has participated in The Moth storytelling series, and has begun to explore the storytelling community in greater Chicagoland. . When he is not tellina stories. he works with an non-profit organization in IT, and enjoys participating in a variety of circus and acrobatics arts with his wife Amy and son CJ.